Magazine

Your IRA Deserves an Upgrade

By Sallie Krawcheck

January 31, 2018

Whether you’re sipping drinks on the lanai or pulling a House Hunters International and relaxing in Cuenca or doing something else cool entirely, you know you want to retire in style. And you deserve a retirement account designed to help you do just that.

That’s why Ellevest flips retirement planning on its head and brings you a totally different IRA — one that’s specifically built for women.

Yes, for women — but not in the Bic Pen “For Her” way. There are gender-specific differences that impact our ability to save and what we’ll need to do to make our retirement the best long weekend ever. Some other financial advisors don't recognize these differences, and your IRA might reflect that. If so, instead of a personalized portfolio, you get a...basic one.

So You Can Retire Like A Woman

We’ve heard it all before. Men are from Mars; women are from Venus. Men are better at X because, well, just because, and women — bless our hearts — can’t hack it because...we’re women.

You know you want to retire in style. And you deserve a retirement account designed to help you do just that.

A lot of these “differences” between genders are bull, but some gender-based differences do have a real impact when you’re planning for retirement. Like that women, on average, outlive men, so our money needs to last for a longer retirement than men’s. Also, our salaries grow at different rates, so we need to be smarter about how much we save and when we do it.

At Ellevest, we build personalized investment portfolios for your IRA with those differences factored in. We use a gender-based salary curve to see how your salary will likely grow over the course of your career. From there, we estimate how much you can save and invest over those years, and we recommend contribution amounts accordingly.

Other advisors? Well, given that some 85%+ of traditional financial advisors are men, they might be assuming that your salary grows at a fixed rate, but research shows that isn’t the case. It stinks, but it’s true: Women’s salaries peak earlier than men’s (talk about frustrating). And this impacts how much you’re able to save, as well as how much money you can aim for in retirement.

So You Can See Your Number

Speaking of retirement goals, how much money do you think you need to retire?

Tough question, right? Ellevest makes it easier for you to answer because we give you a goal amount — in dollars — for how much you can spend annually during retirement. This is instead of industry convention, which is to forecast for you a lump sum; not very useful for determining what your annual budget might look like. We use your salary, existing assets (like a 401(k) or other investment account), and your estimated timeline to estimate how much money you’ll want for each of your retirement years. And our contribution recommendations help you see how much you should contribute to your Ellevest IRA to stay on track for reaching that goal.

By the way, if you think, “Hey, that feels like it’s on the high side” or “Hmmm, I might want to live a little larger when I’m an old lady” when you see your goal amount for your Ellevest IRA, you can change it. We’ve built this to give you the freedom to adjust it until it feels right. That includes tweaking your timeline and recommended contributions, too.

So You Can Own Your Retirement

When it comes to getting things done, there’s nothing quite like having a plan. Seriously — there was a study in the British Journal of Health Psychology that showed a strong correlation between writing down a goal and following through with it.

What does that look like for retirement? Here’s how it looks at Ellevest: We give you savings recommendations on all of your retirement accounts, including your non-Ellevest ones. So saving for retirement goes from a hard-to-describe, overwhelming-to-think-about...thing...and turns into something you can stick with, track, and feel great about.

Speaking of keeping track of your goals: If you have other Ellevest goals set up, transferring your IRA will bring all of your retirement and non-retirement goals together in one place (helloooo, fewer passwords and browser tabs). So not only will you have a better grasp of what your retirement could look like, you’ll see how your retirement goal fits into the bigger picture of your financial future.

And the process of transferring your IRA to Ellevest is super easy. It’s all online: You can start your IRA transfer within minutes, see (and adjust, if you want) your recommended Ellevest IRA portfolio, and then...just sign off on it and relax. We’ll reach out to your IRA provider to take care of the rest, and if we need additional information from you, we’ll get in touch. Also important: We won’t charge you any fees for bringing your IRA over to Ellevest, and you won’t be taxed for the IRA transfer either.

This is how Ellevest makes saving for retirement simple, stress-free, and personalized. Sound like something Future You deserves? Then it’s time to take control of your retirement.

The information provided should not be relied upon as investment advice or recommendations, does not constitute a solicitation to buy or sell securities and should not be considered specific legal, investment or tax advice.

The information provided does not take into account the specific objectives, financial situation or particular needs of any specific person.

Diversification does not ensure a profit or protect against a loss in a declining market. There is no guarantee that any particular asset allocation or mix of funds will meet your investment objectives or provide you with a given level of income.

Investing entails risk including the possible loss of principal and there is no assurance that the investment will provide positive performance over any period of time.

Money is power.Invest like a woman.

We create personalized investment portfolios based on your finances and a gender-specific salary curve. Get started: Open an account today.